Countrywide Insurance Group named Steve Cardinal president and chief operating officer of Countrywide Insurance Services. As a member of Countrywide Insurance Group’s executive team, Cardinal will oversee all aspects of Countrywide Insurance Services. He also will spearhead efforts to hire agents in branches and call centers in an expansion across the country.
Prior to joining Countrywide Insurance Group, Cardinal was with Allstate Insurance. He has 16 years of agency sales and agency management experience.
James A. Sweeney Jr. was appointed vice president of Liberty Mutual Agency Markets, and manager of systems development planning and management for that Liberty Mutual Group strategic business unit. Sweeney will work with information technology resources of Liberty Mutual Agency Markets.
Prior to joining Liberty Mutual, Sweeney served as second vice president with Guardian Life Insurance Co. of America, a position he has held since July 2004. Sweeney also formerly served as an associate partner at IBM Business Consulting Services, and as a senior manager with Ernst & Young LLP.
New York-based Integro Insurance Brokers named Ian Ullman chief compliance officer and risk manager. Ullman will work with senior management to improve efficiency and client service, ensure compliance with applicable laws and regulations, and address the firm’s insurance needs.
Ullman joins Integro from Marsh, where he served as litigation counsel for the past seven years. He also served as lead attorney on several of the regulatory investigations that followed Marsh’s settlement with former New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.
Ed Calabrese, president and chief operating officer for Hull & Co. Inc. announced his retirement in June. He has more than half a century of insurance business experience.
“After 32 wonderful years at Hull & Co., and over 50 years in this great industry, it is time to hang up my hat and smell the flowers,” Calabrese said. “In August my family and I have rented a villa in the Tuscan Hills of Italy and this will be the first of many such trips for Mary and me in the years to come.”
Calabrese began his career in New York with Continental Casualty Co. after serving in the Korean War with the U.S. Marine Corps.
Mike Riordan was named president and CEO to replace Calabrese. Riordan will remain in the St. Petersburg, Fla., office.
Bob McGrew will move to Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., to assume the role of executive vice president and take on the duties of the chief operating officer.
Risk Management Solutions based in Newark, Calif., named Robert Bentley chief operating officer. Bentley, who was previously global chief operating officer at Guy Carpenter & Co. LLC., will be responsible for all operational aspects of RMS and will report directly to Hemant Shah, president and CEO of RMS.
Bentley began his career at Guy Carpenter in 1987 as a property broker. He moved to Aon Re in 1993 and returned to Guy Carpenter in 1996 as a founding member of the company’s Property Specialty and as a registered representative of Marsh & McLennan Securities Corp. In January 2000, he moved from the Property Specialty division to assume leadership of Guy Carpenter’s Instrat operations. He later assumed the role of western region manager and the position of global COO in 2005.
Broker Hilb Rogal & Hobbs Co. of Richmond, Va., hired Mary S. Botkin as senior vice president and health care industry practice leader. Botkin will be responsible for helping the practice grow revenues by working with the steering committee, other practice members and HRH branch offices.
Botkin joins HRH from Alliant Insurance Services, where she most recently was president of the health care division. Prior to working at Alliant, she was southwest region health care practice leader for Aon Risk Solutions.
Marsh Inc. established a renewable energy team and named Susan K. Stokes and Tom Sexton as its co-leaders. The team will work with the firm’s Global Marine and Energy Practice and the Power and Utilities Industry Practice.
Stokes, who is based at Marsh’s world headquarters in New York, will be responsible for the team in the Americas. Sexton, who is based in London, will be responsible for Marsh’s Renewable Energy in Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Africa.
San Francisco-based Majestic Insurance Co., the U.S.-based primary insurance subsidiary of CRM Holdings Ltd., appointed James C. Kilduff senior vice president of underwriting.
Kilduff has more than 26 years of experience, the past 17 in excess workers’ compensation insurance and reinsurance. He will work to expand Majestic’s excess workers’ compensation business.
California’s State Compensation Insurance Fund promoted David West to vice president and member of the Executive Committee.
West brings 27 years of State Fund experience to his new post. He started his career in 1980 as a personnel services analyst. In that position, he created and implemented the group’s first labor relations program. The program’s success led to his appointment as labor relations analyst and supervisor of the then-newly established Labor Relations Unit. He was later promoted to government relations officer, then San Francisco District office manager. Most recently, he was underwriting manager.
Jason Monteforte joined Cypress Point-Arrowhead General Insurance Agency Inc. as vice president of marketing for its workers’ compensation program. Monteforte will be responsible for developing new producer relationships and expanding the worker’s compensation program in California. He has nine years of underwriting experience, the most recent six years as an insurance broker and internal marketing representative for a national brokerage in New York and California.
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